Revenge of the Sorcerer King 2 - 20

Hey Everybody. I saw that I accidentally posted a chapter that was three chapters ahead. I condensed some of the earlier chapter when I compiled them into a book so that is why everything is a bit off. Sorry about that. 

Chapter 20

Oberon

As Grodo moved in front of the party and took a defensive stance, I aimed my hand at the head of one of the living armors. They had to have a core that animated them, much like the golems. Adding a bit more juice to the spell, I spent another Destruction Ray that sliced clean through the head of the living armor. 

We could see through the hole, but there was no indication that I’d struck a core. After a second or two, the damage started to repair itself. I grunted before I raised my other hand. Since I managed to damage with the first level of the spell, I would switch to rapid fire. With a quick chant, I sent ten rays down the hall all slamming into the living armor at various places.

The armor took two more steps before it came to a stop. The cracked surface of a smooth orb inside the breastplate showed that one of my spells managed to do some real damage. Another armor took its place, and the line was back to three strong. Given my spell usage, I was already down thirty percent of my active mana pool.

“This isn’t going to work. I hate to lose the armor and weapons, but we’re going to have to go with plan b.”

“Understood,” Irgire moved just behind Grodo then pulled in a deep breath. With a roar, he exhaled his poison breath down the hall melting the stonework and few decorations that lined the hall. The rolling cloud of poison slammed into the living armor and immediately started having an effect. 

A wave of light rolled from behind the armors dispersing the poison cloud before it could work into the armors and damage their cores. Looking in the direction the light came from, I saw an armor wielding a staff instead of a sword. We would have to deal with him before we could even start to deal with the twenty other armors slowly making their way down the hall.

“Its about to get very wet in here,” I said then raised my hands.

Chanting quickly, I went with a spell from the Advanced Magic branch. Pouring more mana than I typically would have liked due to my partial lock, black clouds formed through the hallway. Rain and wind soon made their appearance as the storm took full affect. “Lightning Storm!”

Lightning began to pop between the armors and the clouds every blink of the eye. I focused on the mage armor in the back as it started to form another light spell of some sort. It was quickly interrupted though, as just about every centimeter was struck by lightning bolts.

Even as high level as it was, it couldn’t handle the massive number of lightning strikes and before we could brace ourselves, the armor exploded into a ball of mana fueled flames that took just over half of the hallway with it. We were all thrown back by the force of the explosion. 

I glanced around to make sure everyone’s limbs were still attached. “Whoops.”

We corrected ourselves and took in the situation with the armors. While the explosion did take out two more of the armors along with the mage armor, the rest were still alive and moving again. I hated using poison on them as that would likely turn the armor into rusted useless pieces of garbage, but we needed to push on.

Irgire was already readying another poison breath to send at the recovering armors. I did have to say it was a lot easier to deal with them with them being so slow. He exhaled with a roar and the cloud washed down the hall again. He must have changed the consistency of the breath as it clung to the ground rather than blow out the now gaping hole towards the end of the hall. 

I fired pinpoint Destruction Rays at living armors that had their core’s exposed. The cores were even weaker than I expected, shattering with ease from my spell without any armor to protect them. 

Even with Irgire and I working our magics and taking out nine of the armors, the armors still managed to get to our section of the hallway. I thought about it for a split second, then handed Grodo Promise. “Shouldn’t have any trouble with their weapons,” I said patting him on the back. 

Grodo jumped into action bringing Promise around in a horizontal sweep. The armors met the weapon with their own, which I was disappointed to see were able to survive contact with the ancient blade. Once the armors were in combat range, they completely changed. 

Moving ten times faster, they began to assault Grodo who only managed to keep up with them due to his level gap over them. He was close to level five hundred after all. Still, Grodo was beginning to take nicks from near misses from the armors. 

I upped my mana output on my Destruction Ray again, and turned to the battle, I narrowed the beam to the smallest point then fired off the spell. The tiny ray cut through three of the armors before it lost its penetrating power. I moved my finger and cut lines through the armors looking for the cores. They weren’t in the same spot for all the armors after all.

Ted trying to help was sending lightning bolts down the passageway, only he couldn’t sustain it long enough to build up a significant charge in any of the armors. The most he caused was for them to jitter and stutter. Gobrin was helping as well by throwing sheets of ice to stall the remain armors for as long as possible.

Irgire and I managed to finish off five more over about a minute. As they were closer, Irgire couldn’t use his poison to the fullest and was having to restrain himself. Grodo had also taken quite a beating from the minute he held the hallway. If Grodo fell, we would be sorely pressed to hold the point and I worried withdrawing would cause the armors to reset. I did have memories of such events happening in my past.

A figure ran past and Gobluke sank his spear into the living armor that had replaced the one I’d just killed. The spear, while lesser than the armors, contained enough mana from being locked in here for so long that it managed to affect the living armor. He joined Grodo in holding the hallway.

He was doing his best to keep his distance but the living armors just had too much speed over him once they entered combat mode. Luckily, it was their arm and attack speed rather than their movement speed. He was able to strike the armors just strongly enough to keep out of range of their swords.

We quickly finished off the rest of the armors. Gobluke got cocky and took a nasty gash across his chest, but he would survive. Grodo was the most damaged, having lost his left arm in the conflict as well as suffering from countless gashes and dents. My mana pool was almost gone as well even if it was refilling quickly.

“If this is just the first hall, I’m not sure we can make it through the rest of the castle,” Ted said breathing heavily. He had dropped to the ground after using all his mana. Gobrin was next to him on his hands and knees.

“That was a bit harder than I anticipated. I doubt there will only be one mage armor next time as well,” I said looking at the destruction.

“I should be able to flying during the rest, not that it will help if there are more of the mages,” Irgire added. He was leaning against the wall thoroughly exhausted himself.

If the forces outside the castle didn’t find an exit, we might have to adopt the long-term approach after all. Fighting the armors until our levels were more evenly matched. This wasn’t too much of an issue other than I would have to leave the outside world to Alessa and Helena if they weren’t trapped in the dungeon as well. Fortunately, Khaar was able to serve in my place for the most part.

“That just leaves how long it takes for the armors to reset.”

“You are thinking of the wait approach?” Irgire asked and I nodded in reply.

“If the foot soldiers are this powerful, what do you think the boss will be capable of? We need to at least get to level one fifty and we’ll re-evaluate then.”

“I agree with that! I was basically useless during that fight. Gobrin and I need to learn some new magic that can actually affect these things,” Ted added.

“Alright. I will attempt a magic sending later to try and contact Alessa. Then we will settle in for the long approach.”

Alessa

After my bath, I decided to go talk to my mother instead of resting. I hadn’t seen her in a few days and worried about her. Embarrassingly, she sort of slipped my mind once I got into the my position as Oberon’s right hand vampire. I chuckled at the ridiculous thought. I wasn’t sure what Oberon consider me as, but I doubted it was his second in command. Helena would be better suited for that.

Knocking on my mother’s door, I waited for a response. After about a minute, I focused inside the room but couldn’t detect anyone inside. I pushed the door open and walked in. Sniffing the air, I realized it had been about two days or so since anyone had been in the room. I looked around for any clues about where my mother might have gone. 

I reached the reading desk and found a sealed note with my name on it. Dread filled me as I picked the letter up. With a flick of a nail, I unsealed the letter.

Dear Alessa.

I am sorry to do this after you worked so hard to find me. I thought I could contend with the fact that our ancestor had returned as undead and even more that you have become a vampire… It looked like my mother paused for a long time as the ink had formed a rather large dot on the last letter of vampire. I am leaving. I promise not to cause you or Oberon any trouble, but I am sworn by the Goddess Terina. No matter how I am treated by mortals, I can’t betray the goddess that helped me through those times. Please… Just forget about me.

Amiere Darkfeather

I stared at the letter without blinking. A feat I found astonishingly easy as a vampire. My vision suddenly went red as anger flared through me. She would rather go back to the mortals that tortured and kept her prisoner just because some goddess whispered sweet words to her from behind bars! Did Terina help her?! Did Terina tell the nobles to leave us alone?!

I screamed at the top of my lungs. The walls around me cracked as darkness flooded around me. The room suddenly felt constricting. I swung my arms and the room exploded around me. With a roar, I jumped into the air tearing the ceiling apart in the process. The sun only served to increase my irritation.

With another roar, black clouds started to fill the sky around me as my mana flared around me. The fact that I was flying didn’t register. I felt something welling up in my chest. I screamed to let it out and felt a wave of mana leave my mouth. There was a massive blast from under me. Turning, I saw that part of the castle was of fire with a large hole in one of the towers.

“Alessa! Where are you!?” I heard in my mind. Helena’s voice helped calm me down a bit and the red receded slight from my eyes. I looked around and found her a bit off in the distance.

“I’m right here. Above the castle,” I sent back though I felt sluggish. 

“The only thing above the castle is a giant phoenix made from shadows and mana. It appears to be attacking the castle.” 

As I watched, Helena sent a wave of ice at me. Pain ripped through part of my body. Why was she attacking me?! The red that hadn’t gone away fully returned and I screamed at her. The mana welled in my chest before it exploded out streaking towards her. She sent even more ice at me, but I didn’t sit there and take it. I dodged to the side, and sent over blast of mana at her. 

“LEAVE ME ALONE!”

The darkness around me grew even denser. I shot towards Helena as black bolts of lightning arced around me. She backpedaled and tried to get away from me, but I wasn’t having any of that. I sped up and collided with her my darkness rolling around her. 

“…” I swiped and bit at her. “Ale…” I used all my force to hurt her like she hurt me. “Alessa!” The raging storm around me calmed ever so slightly. “Alessa! Stop! I didn’t realize it was you!” Everything seemed to pause around me as we floated freely in the sky. The black mana still arced around us but not quite a violently.

“Helena?”

“That’s right! I don’t know why but you’ve transformed into some sort of Greater Sky Beast.”

The red faded at her words and I looked around. I couldn’t see my own feet, only the moving purple darkness. That was when I realized I could feel some sort of appendage moving near my back in a flapping motion. I was flying! The red faded completely.

“Helena? What happened?” I couldn’t really recall the last few minutes.

“Other than you blew up part of the castle before trying to devour me. I’m not sure,” she replied. I glanced down and saw that the castle was indeed on fire around a large hole on one of the towers.

“I was… reading a letter from my mother. She left me!” I screamed the anger returning.

“Shh! I understand. Calm down,” Helena said. She had found what appeared to be my head as she stroked my cheek. I thought I could swallow her in one gulp with our size difference now.

“What do you know!?” I screamed the mana around me jerking and rolling with my emotions.

“I know at different pain. I had to kill my parents.” My anger cooled instantly. The rolling mana fueled darkness recoiling around me some. “Let’s land and I’ll tell you my amazing story,” Helena said with one of the saddest smile I thought I’d ever seen.

At that moment, the storm clouds even further above us broke and rain dropped all around us. The fire on the castle was quickly put out. We landed in the middle of what was once my mother’s chambers. The darkness around me rushed in as I felt my mana waning. Before I realized what was happening, I was back on my feet at least until I lurched forward and spat blood over the floor.

“What the?” I groaned as blackness replaced the redness that had dominated my vision a minute ago. 

“Transformation recoil. It will get better as you grow more accustom to your new form,” Helena said rubbing my back as I spat out another spray of blood.

“Fuck.” Before I could fight it, my vision grew dim.